By Ann Coulter
With the vast majority of Americans opposing a strike against Syria, President Obama has requested that Congress vote on his powers as commander in chief under the Constitution. The president doesn’t need congressional approval to shoot a few missiles into Syria, nor — amazingly — has he said he’ll abide by such a vote, anyway.
Why is Congress even having a vote? This is nothing but a fig leaf to cover Obama’s own idiotic “red line” ultimatum to President Bashar al-Assad of Syria on chemical weapons. The Nobel Peace Prize winner needs to get Congress on the record so that whatever happens, the media can blame Republicans.
No Republican who thinks seriously about America’s national security interests — by which I mean to exclude John McCain and Lindsey Graham — can support Obama’s “plan” to shoot blindly into this hornet’s nest.
It would be completely different if we knew with absolute certainty that Assad was responsible for chemical attacks on his own people. (I’m still waiting to see if it was a Syrian upset about a YouTube video.)
It would be different if instead of killing a few hundred civilians, Assad had killed 5,000 civilians with poison gas in a single day, as well as tens of thousands more with chemical weapons in the past few decades.
It would be different if Assad were known to torture his own people, administer summary executions, rapes, burnings and electric shocks, often in front of the victim’s wife or children.
It would be different if Assad had acted aggressively toward the United States itself, perhaps attempting to assassinate a former U.S. president or giving shelter to terrorists who had struck within the U.S. — someone like Maj. Nidal Hasan, the Fort Hood terrorist.
It would be different if Assad were stirring up trouble in the entire Middle East by, for example, paying bounties to the families of suicide bombers in other countries.
It would also be different if we could be sure that intervention in Syria would not lead to a multi-nation conflagration.
It would be different if we knew that any action against Syria would not put al-Qaida or the Muslim Brotherhood in power, but rather would result in a functioning, peaceful democracy.
And it would be different if an attack on Syria would so terrify other dictators in the region that they would instantly give up their WMDs — say, Iran abandoning its nuclear program.
If all of that were true, this would be a military intervention worth supporting!
All of that was true about Iraq, but the Democrats hysterically opposed that war. They opposed it even after all this was known to be true — indeed, especially after it was known to be true! The loudest opponent was Barack Obama.
President Saddam Hussein of Iraq had attempted to assassinate former president George H.W. Bush. He gave shelter to Abdul Rahman Yasin, a conspirator in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing. He paid bounties to the families of suicide bombers in Israel.
Soon after Bush invaded Iraq in 2003, Libya’s Moammar Gadhafi was so terrified of an attack on his own country, he voluntarily relinquished his WMDs — which turned out to be far more extensive than previously imagined.
Al-Qaida not only did not take over Iraq, but got its butt handed to it in Iraq, where the U.S. and its allies killed thousands of al-Qaida fighters, including the leader of al-Qaida in Iraq, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. Iraq became the first genuine Arab democracy, holding several elections and presiding over a trial of Saddam Hussein.
Does anyone imagine that any of this would result from an Obama-led operation in Syria? How did his interventions work out in Egypt and Libya?
As for chemical weapons — the casus belli for the current drums of war — in a matter of hours on March 16, 1988, Saddam Hussein slaughtered roughly 5,000 Kurdish civilians in Halabja with mustard, sarin and VX gas. The victims blistered, vomited or laughed hysterically before dropping dead. Thousands more would die later from the after-effects of these poisons.
Saddam launched nearly two dozen more chemical attacks on the Kurds, resulting in at least 50,000 deaths, perhaps three times that many. That’s to say nothing of the tens of thousands of Iranians Saddam killed with poison gas. Indeed, in making the case against Assad recently, Secretary of State John Kerry said his use of chemical weapons put him in the same league as “Adolf Hitler and Saddam Hussein.”
Not even close — but may we ask why Kerry sneered at the war that removed such a monster as Hussein?
There were endless United Nations reports and resolutions both establishing that Saddam had used chemical weapons and calling on him to give them up. (For the eighth billionth time, we did find chemical weapons in Iraq, just no “stockpiles.” Those had been moved before the war, according to Saddam’s own general, Georges Sada — to Syria.)
On far less evidence, our current president accuses Assad of using chemical weapons against a fraction of the civilians provably murdered with poison gas by Saddam Hussein. So why did Obama angrily denounce the military operation that removed Hussein? Why did he call that a “war of choice”?
Obama says Assad — unlike that great statesman Saddam Hussein — has posed “a challenge to the world.” But the world disagrees. Even our usual ally, Britain, disagrees. So Obama demands the United States act alone to stop a dictator, who — compared to Saddam — is a piker.
At this point, Assad is at least 49,000 dead bodies short of the good cause the Iraq War was, even if chemical weapons had been the only reason to take out Saddam Hussein.
honeybee Said:
Heh! 😆
But seriously, I posted that video because:
1. of your nice Jewish boys comment.
2. Once I saw what it was, I thought it should be seen for the revulsion that it is. I’m disgusted that anyone actually produced such sewage, depicting Jews this way, for TV.
@ bernard ross:
The Jews need more studs, never would guess your one,but hey Sugar, one never knows,do one.!!!!!!!!!!
honeybee Said:
@ Shy Guy:
@ bernard ross:
Such innocents,really!!!!!!!!!!!!
@ Shy Guy:
So you do like to look at cheerleaders!!!!!!!!!!!!!Cupcake
Shy Guy Said:
me too, talk about mixed feelings where humor turns to horror at the thought that it could really happen. It was funny and frightening.
bernard ross Said:
I almost flipped backward in my chair when I realized where that clip was going.
Shy Guy Said:
After sending that link I am worried about you 🙂
@ honeybee: my error: I should have said:
“..but Obama ISN’T dancing fast enough for the saudis.”
(unlike the saudis, he has an electorate to satisfy.)
yamit82 Said:
you may be right but…. When is a WAVE merely a number of isolated coincidental, individual waves. The WAVE is a series of coordinated behaviors over a period of time. Each individual performs his individual wave. The MSM reports on his wave as an isolated individual action. If enough individual performers are missing or do not follow through then the WAVE cannot be perceived even after it has been completed. IMHO, we ha have a wave, the MSM reports on each individual action as if it is an isolated coincidence. Some participants dont perform to scratch, some drop out some are out of time. When it is over it may or may not be noticed. Somebody called for a WAVE, some are performing, some out of time, the MSM reports on isolated, unrelated, coincidences that make no sense individually but are clear when seeing the WAVE.
from your bbc link. Erdogan does not appear to be following through on his side of the deal with the kurds.
The one enjoyable sideshow of this whole ME drama is watching the absolute buffoon erdogan deconstruct. He has managed to alienate every prior ally in his quest for the caliphate: Israel,Syria,Iran, GCC, Egypt, EU, and next will be the US. Although a long shot,without much basis, I would not be surprised to see Erdogan get Morsi’s fate. Erdogan does not need to be given the rope to hang himself because he manufactures his own rope. 😛
bernard ross Said:
Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar.
http://www.middle-east-online.com/english/?id=61076
honeybee Said:
Nice to meet you.
(Seriously, America, you’re sick)
They got screwed. Egypt, PA, GCC, US want to hand over gaza to fatah. Israel might be in agreement.
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4427731,00.html
I think erdogans deal with the kurds also depended on US performance in Syria and the expectation that the kurds would go fight Assad. Perhaps Obama’s inaction is causing the grand deal to unravel.
bernard ross Said:
Yawls making Yamit 82 and Shy guy look like nice Jewish boys.!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Sugar Pie
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1
honeybee Said:
yes but Obama is dancing fast enough for the saudis.
honeybee Said:
are you alluding to the chicago bath house rumors?
@ yamit82:
@ bernard ross:
Obama’s “red-line” has turned PINK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
@ bernard ross:
I thought that was the purpose of the USA Army????????????
@ yamit82:
It struck me that the Egyptian army could be quite useful as mercenaries for the GCC. Like the Hessians for the British.
@ yamit82:
a Meditation for you,Zev: http://youtu.be/DfVsVy0ogGs
@ yamit82:
Thank you for the information ,I always appriciate that you take the time to inform me. The Lakota believed that courage resided in the heart and strenth in the liver. The women poked a hole in his ear drums so he would be able to hear in the after life as he did not listen in this one. His body body was not multilated further because he had a child with a Cheyeene woman and the Cheyenne considered him family.